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Friendship Quotes by Samuel Johnson

55 Friendship quotes by Samuel Johnson

All Friendship quotes Samuel Johnson’s page

Samuel Johnson reminds us that true friendship is a rare treasure, not something to test like a scientific experiment. He says love and esteem should be given without doubt, and that kindness that comes from the heart is worth more than any contract. He also warns that many acquaintances are easy to find, but only a few friends earn the deep respect that lasts a lifetime.

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I am a great friend of public amusements, they keep people from vice.

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He endearing elegance of female friendship.

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My dear friend, clear your mind of cant.

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Men become friends by a community of pleasures.

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My dear friend, clear your mind of can't.

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The endearing elegance of female friendship.

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Friendship is not always the sequel of obligation…

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I am a great friend to public amusements; for they keep people from vice.

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The longer we live the more we think and the higher the value we put on friendship and tenderness towards parents and…

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It is as foolish to make experiments upon the constancy of a friend, as upon the chastity of a wife.

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In Shakespeare's plays, the mourner hastening to bury his friend is all the time colliding with the reveller hastening to his wine.

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The feeling of friendship is like that of being comfortably filled with roast beef; love, like being enlivened with champagne.

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An old friend never can be found, and nature has provided that he cannot easily be lost.

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Friendship is seldom lasting but between equals, or where the superiority on one side is reduced by some equivalent advantage on the…

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Friendship, like love, is destroyed by long absence, though it may be increased by short intermissions.

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Friendship, peculiar boon of Heaven, The noble mind's delight and pride, To men and angels only given, To all the lower world…

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When we see our enemies and friends gliding away before us, let us not forget that we are subject to the general…

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If a man does not make new acquaintances as he advances through life, he will soon find himself left alone. A man,…

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Always set high value on spontaneous kindness. He whose inclination prompts him to cultivate your friendship of his own accord will love…

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To let friendship die away by negligence and silence is certainly not wise. It is voluntarily to throw away one of the…

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Every man has frequent grievances which only the solicitude of friendship will discover and remedy, and which would remain for ever unheeded…

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That friendship may be at once fond and lasting, there must not only be equal virtue on each part, but virtue of…

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The friendship which is to be practised or expected by common mortals, must take its rise from mutual pleasure, and must end…

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Never, my dear Sir, do you take it into your head that I do not love you; you may settle yourself in…

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When a friend is carried to his grave, we at once find excuses for every weakness, and palliation of every fault. We…

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Friendship, like love, is destroyed by long absence, though it may be increased by short intermissions. What we have missed long enough…

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The safe and general antidote against sorrow is employment. It is commonly observed, that among soldiers and seamen, though there is much…

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“My dear friend, clear your mind of cant [excessive thought]. You may talk as other people do: you may say to a…

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They whose activity of imagination is often shifting the scenes of expectation, are frequently subject to such sallies of caprice as make…

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In order that all men may be taught to speak truth, it is necessary that all likewise should learn to hear it;…

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I would injure no man, and should provoke no resentment. I would relieve every distress, and should enjoy the benedictions of gratitude.…

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I am not able to instruct you. I can only tell that I have chosen wrong. I have passed my time in…

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“Shakespeare's plays are not in the rigorous and critical sense either tragedies or comedies, but compositions of a distinct kind; exhibiting the…

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Officious, innocent, sincere, Of every friendless name the friend.

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The most fatal disease of friendship is gradual decay.

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It is no less a proof of eminence to have many enemies than many friends

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Life has no pleasure higher or nobler than that of friendship.

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Most vices may be committed very genteelly: a man may debauch his friend's wife genteelly: he may cheat at cards genteelly

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Friendship, compounded of esteem and love, derives from one its tenderness and its permanence from the other.

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I am a friend to subordination, as most conducive to the happiness of society. There is a reciprocal pleasure in governing and…

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More by Samuel Johnson

The size of a man's understanding might always be justly measured by his mirth.

Pound St. Paul's Church into atoms, and consider any single atom; it is to be sure, good for nothing; but put all these atoms…

You can never be wise unless you love reading.

If our aim is to praise, we should forget to criticize; if our aim is to criticize, we should remember to praise

All theory is against free will; all experience is for it.

Had I learned to fiddle, I should have done nothing else.

It is as foolish to make experiments upon the constancy of a friend, as upon the chastity of a wife.

Resolve not to be poor: whatever you have, spend less. Poverty is a great enemy to human happiness; it certainly destroys liberty, and it…

The basis of all excellence is truth: he that professes love ought to feel its power.

Words are daughters of earth but ideas are sons of heaven.

“The composition of Shakespeare is a forest, in which oaks extend in the air, interspersed sometimes with weeds and brambles, and sometimes giving shelting…

“The cherubim were never intended as an object of worship, because they were only the appendices to another thing. But a thing is then…

Nobody has the right to put another under such a difficulty that he must either hurt the person by telling the truth or hurt…

That kind of life is most happy which affords us most opportunities of gaining our own self-esteem

The time will come to every human being when it must be known how well he can bear to die.